against iran thank you very much for joining me today thanks very much it's a pleasure to be here dr long a bipartisan group of national security experts are the authors and signatories of this extensive report according to your findings is iran's nuclear program currently a threat to the us president it's not a threat to the united states iran's nuclear program is under our international atomic energy agency action. network that they had previously done according to the u.s. intelligence community on nuclear weapons it's been suspended so at present iran's nuclear program is not a major threat to the united states the concern is that it could very rapidly become one how rapidly in less than a year according to some estimates and other estimates more than a year a lot depends on whether you're talking about the production of fissile material the highly enriched uranium for a bomb or an actual deliverable weapon a deliverable weapon would take longer production of fissile material could you know within a few few months produce enough or for a bomb well within

a few months both in a few weeks americans will be heading to the polls to vote for a new u.s. president or keep the current one in the white house many believe that israel has seen this time as a window of opportunity to strike iran dragging the u.s. into a war is there still a threat that it would do so in the main remaining weeks i think the concern about a possible israeli strike was higher a few weeks ago the israelis are now dissolving their parliament and calling for new elections on january twenty second so this i think changes a lot of the previous calculation of people that thought the israeli government might act before the u.s. elections i think now tend to believe wait until at least after u.s. elections if not actually after the new israeli elections now opinions vary but do you think iran has an intention. acquire

a nuclear bomb i mean this is literally the sixty four thousand dollar question you know there's a pretty good read on what iran's capabilities in terms of uranium enrichment are the big question which i don't think anyone can give a highly confident answer to is does iran want a what people refer to as a threshold capability in other words its ability to produce a nuclear weapon quickly or do they want an actual deployed weapon. according to u.s. intelligence community and i think most other observers iran just hasn't made that decision in part because they don't need to and they want to get to that threshold capability before they make any decisions about whether to go to go farther than that threshold because there's no point making that decision early in fact it might be detected by western intelligence and so you could tip your hand before you get to that threshold so i think that decision hasn't been made you don't seem to be putting the threat level of iran's nuclear program as high as some u.s. officials the republican candidates for example mitt romney and his vice

presidential candidate paul ryan have been in past weeks essentially saying that iran is major grave threat are they exaggerating at all with their rhetoric i don't think there's a tremendous amount of exaggeration that iran is a threat generally i mean you know the united states and iran have had a pretty hostile relationship for three decades actually more than three decades now they have you know had problematic relations in the gulf they've had conflict via proxies in iraq so i think it's not wrong to say iran is a threat the question is whether iran its nuclear program is a real threat to the united states at the present and it isn't at the present but the concern is as i said it could very quickly become a threat so let's go back to your report according to the findings and extended u.s. military strike on iran's nuclear facilities whether alone or in concert with israel could set back iran. 's nuclear program for four years but it still would not

guarantee that iran would not eventual acquire a nuclear bomb why is that it's because the technology of iran already has some pieces and parts they need to acquire from overseas but unless you can guarantee that you can kill off everyone in iran that has knowledge of these programs and their ability to produce these basic components such as aluminum rotors you can't guarantee that that the program can never be restarted so you can destroy what they have now but their ability to rebuild that even if you can make it take a very long time to rebuild that's what can't be destroyed what kind of long term military commitment with the u.s. have to make to ensure that iran would never be able to build a nuclear bomb i mean it would be similar to what happened with iraq the only way to ensure a country does not acquire a nuclear weapon is to is to forcibly change the regime and go in on the ground occupy yes that's the that's the only way to one hundred percent be sure that the current iranian regime never acquires a nuclear weapon so we're talking about

a ten year war. potentially it could be iran as a as a larger country than both iraq and afghanistan combined so if you're talking about a war that would certainly be on that scale where there would be ten times harder not quite as hard who knows but it would be a very substantial military commitment should the u.s. be concerned about iran's unconventional war capabilities i think the united states is definitely be concerned about iran's unconventional war capabilities by its nature it's harder to sort of define what unconventional war capabilities are and you can count airplanes you can count missiles unconventional it's a little harder to judge but iran has a robust capability for unconventional war they have special operations forces they have claimed us and services they have a variety of capabilities to conduct attacks without you know not in this sort of typical military way at the end of the day is this really just a problem for israel iran possible determination of. nuclear weapons or is this

a problem for the u.s. as well i think it's a problem for the entire world i mean certainly the you know the entire world has has asked iran to clarify its intentions and has taken steps i think it's a much bigger problem for israel than the united states if for no other reason than proximity in the skies you know israel is a country of you know about the you know in terms of populations the size of new york city and geographically it's quite small it's quite close so i think it's a much bigger problem for israel that it is for the united states but that doesn't make it not a problem for the united states and the rest of the world how much would a war with iran cost the u.s. economy it's very difficult to tell but you know our estimates that even a modest war would would hurt the u.s. economy in part because it would drive up oil prices even a modest in terms of duration spike in oil prices you know the u.s. recovery right now is quite fragile the world recovery is sort of stalled in places . making modest recovery in others so a big spike in oil prices even if it was only for

a few weeks would certainly damage the u.s. economy if it were a longer extended commitment and big disruption in oil than it would be much more also to the global economy to the global economy and then there's the actual dollar figure to conduct military operations right i mean flying planes dropping bombs these things are are not incredibly expensive but neither are they cheap so it would it would there would be a there would be a substantial cost we think so i want to ask you a question that politicians always reject to answer does israel have nuclear weapons capacity it's something that the israelis have been opaque on by design throughout their history i think most outside observers would say that the israelis do have a nuclear weapons capacity even if it's one that's never really been deployed or tested and as you mentioned benjamin it's now who has dissolved the parliament in israel with new elections expected is in january february twenty second when the how much do you think that will play into the israel iran in comp. i think i think

this coming israeli elections will hinge heavily on on what to do about iran the netanyahu government will have some decisions to make they could be they could be very bold and take action as a caretaker government i think most observers don't think they will and in fact a lot of the campaign will be about what to do about the iranian nuclear program. so i think that's i think will be a huge issue in determining the future of israeli iranian relations so if israel has a stockpile of nuclear weapons as many have reported and iran has not even if you're on board to build one wouldn't that be somewhat of a deterrence policy in place why would israel consider still striking iran the belief is you know if both sides have nuclear weapons no no no one side is going to be foolish enough to use them knowing they're going to face retaliation by the other side said by us soviet union the idea of mutually assured destruction i think the israelis are deeply uncomfortable with this because it

doesn't take hundreds of nuclear weapons to functionally destroy israel as i said israel's a very small country a handful of nuclear weapons maybe even only one nuclear weapon some people refer to israel as a one bomb country could do the same damage it would require hundreds of nuclear weapons to do to a much larger country so i think their concern is why take any risk that maybe the current leadership in iran is completely rational but maybe a future one won't be why take any risk that there could be these kind of miscalculations in a confrontation so say there's an israeli iranian equivalent of a cuban missile crisis say over hezbollah or syria and instead of ending in a in a sort of tense standoff that resolved peacefully as in the cuban missile crisis this one actually results in the exchange of nuclear weapons think the israeli attitude is you know we have maintained all along we will not be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons into the region we don't want anyone else to do so either because why take the risk you know when us president barack. i was

addressing the u.n. general assembly and he was speaking i think iran he said time for negotiations is not unlimited what do you think he meant by that i mean it's do you think that there is some kind of deadline a date that washington hands i don't think there's an exact date but i do think that patience for negotiations particularly after the last round over the summer is sort of wearing thin the iranians put forward a proposal allegedly some of the iranians deny it some don't it's kind of tough to tell sometimes what the iranians are actually saying but the proposal would have called for the lifting of most sanctions in exchange for suspension of many of the more worrisome activities of the iranian nuclear program and the president said look we you know this isn't this isn't serious we're not going to remove everything that gives us leverage in exchange for these minor concessions so i think the feeling is look we will give diplomacy all the time in the world if it's actually working but if it's just a way for the iranians to stall and by the way over the summer iran greatly

increase the rate of putting centrifuges into one of its enrichment plants so i think that's the feeling it's not that there's a specific date but if it looks like all the iranians are doing is using goshi asians as a way to sort of buy time think that's when the president will say look we've given diplomacy you know all the time in the world it hasn't worked your report indicated that a u.s. military strike against iran would motivate the country to build a bomb if that is the case doesn't this threatening rhetoric coming from u.s. and israeli officials also cause damage i think the idea is to calibrate the threat and maybe the united states hasn't always done the best job but the idea is you know you apply all of these levers of persuasion sanctions the threat of military action to say look this isn't a good path to go down let's find another path but you're absolutely right that if you you know if you're trying to convince somebody to do something or else you're going to carry out a threat you don't want to believe in you're going to carry out the threat anyway right because why. would you ever agree to anything if you think you're going to be

attacked anyway so it's it can be tricky you're right to calibrate that rhetoric that you know if you do x. we will do y. but if you don't do x. we won't do what dr austin long thank you very much for speaking of r.t. thanks very much as a great pleasure. the gold fever. turned thousands into slaves. my father but also among others are involved in the mines and since i started working in the mine i stayed here to look a. bit more to nationals. make it a cash cow to be milked dry and it's i think that in this country gold medal logie has an environmental cost which is an acceptable local business was labeled illegal and controlled by criminals you know in order to protect our lives our families and

to work in peace. we are forced to pay protection to illegal groups what price is colombia going to pay. the people. the modest affect on our t.v. . elaine. i've. i've . i've.

lived was. my. from. the.

brighton beach about some from friends to pressure. these stunts on t.v. dot com. the top stories on aussie the lebanese opposition calls for more rallies in the country already violent protests are bold after friday's deadly combination of an apparent result of this crisis to know about. every time to cayle small civilians including deliver children killed in libya as government killings militias show a town traditionally loyal to the old regime a year after the norm like a donkey was code and. protesters scuffle with police as tens of thousands march against austerity in london the country's i could bounce in that turns as greece suffered a nationwide strike souring the mood of an e.u. crisis summit in brussels. sunday new attempts to breach the blockade of gaza and

faulted israeli forces stop a humanitarian ship and arrested thirty minutes i'm told. as the headlines latest sports news coming up next with that tree. company as usual envies all the headlines leading the way. to a win against ten months to go five points clear at the top of the russian crimea they. go. to schools twice as leaders chelsea come from behind to win four to a top of them on the night basically in the english premier league. and up to the top seed. the lines of a final showdown against caroline morsi have stayed off the ballots when in three sets here in moscow. you start there with the football and one shot out of the zone

go deep into stoppage time help angy fight back from a goal down and win two one at home to ten man spots and to guy five points clear at the top of the russian premier league before kickoff fans remembered the victims of the stamp a that killed sixty six spectators during spa taxiway for a cup match against holland. thirty years ago but when the match got underway brazilian strike of elitism is denied by the woodwork before setting up midfield the no for spot now ten minutes before half time but a yellow card either side of the interval for kill combat of left the visitors with ten men missing with the right equalized midway through the second half but with a draw looking imminent an injury time free kick resulted in ensuring the heading into his i met to show angie one two one and remain unbeaten in six league games while sparta behind their second strike defeat. defending champions in eight went with one nil when the time to get banned alexander kick off netting from the

penalty spot on the strike of half time to time his seventh goal of the campaign pressed for more in the second half but fifteen million dollar man holds a powerful free kick from long range by just wide a record signing axel fitz or the ball as any level on points with second place team eskimo sky. and present daraa two places tonight after two goals in the last eighteen minutes gave the home side a two no victory over a lan yet give gainey should be seen noting in the first after the ball rebounded off the post that in church blasted him following a corner to ensure the home side to call three points in the remaining two points play off of the drop side. now on sunday to. scar can go within two points of energy if they beat the fourth place terakhir their second bottom of the ball via struggling a locomotive go to the bottom row stop. let's look at what's going on in england on

saturday substitute scored a late brace is ten man manchester city snatched a two one win away from wayne rooney netted an own goal that also struck twice as manchester united states forty norrish stunned arsenal one nil for their first win of the season but he made little goal against reading gave the reds that time when grabbed a late victory over aston villa swans they held off we can see one west thrash southampton there for one and chelsea stay on the top after one month a second half double helped them win a thrilling london darby for tottenham. i think they really go all in the second half gives them i was feeling. confident some momentum which we knew we had to ride out a little bit brother you know the first time to see me. perform go to think for the rest of to be very much a tool we wanted to impose some women should do so full of majority of the good

from this mortal hold to on sunday sunderland take on newcastle in a feisty northeast darby q.p.r. host everton and the other guy. let's go to weis hockey and haven't got have moved to within three points of the top of the eastern conference a late comeback giving them a three two shootout victory of the service style on saturday for most of the game haven't god were on the back foot service style taking the lead getting kicked off in the middle of the first period and even under a even off found an equaliser service style took the lead again in the final period that being two off getting what looked to be the winner and all hope and haven't guard come back seemed to have evaporated when matty could put him in your sim bin with less than two minutes left but his side no. we gave up was. taken off the next for attack a big gamble paid off and on bill of scoring with just four seconds left to send the game into overtime and when that finished goal konstantin and scored the winner

in a shootout a great game of unguarded no three points behind leaders cracked door in the eastern conference. but it is the nominee who have the best record in the k.h. at the moment alexander ovechkin scoring for them and therefore one win over atlanta puts the number on top of the overall standings and on top of the west with thirty nine points from eighteen matches. now top seeds the face is former world number one caroline wozniacki in sunday's kremmling cup final both needed three set victories in the semi. as a battle hard against another former number one and the revenge of it the serb took the first set quite easily six. power and accuracy in the second taking that six three before claiming the next sixteen for the match finishing things off with a blistering back. she was only playing quite well in. getting the first good shot at the rally which then put me straight into the

defense in i knew that i had to try and turn that around so. i think i started serving a lot better i could at least start the point well and then on the return to step up in do that in pretty much just kind of reverse i was getting the first good shot no i wouldn't play offensively and improve my movement in was able to do that for the rest of the match. that set up the final with their marks was the answer to the fear of it's in the sweden but she too had to fight hard coming through in three sets to reach her third final of the season. i think i really. was fighting out there and you know it's tough on the surface to finish off the point i'm especially you know again we both know that you know each other so well and know each other's game so well so i'm just very happy. through to the finals. you know that i have one more match to go and see how it goes in the men's final is going to seed and be from italy and brazil's thomas believe both won their

semifinals in different fashions seventy breezing past two newsies my legs in straight sets while baluchi needed nearly two and a half hours to get the better of evo colors which. may be on to motor sport and motor g.p. leader your renzo has set a new track record to secure pole position for sunday's pivotal malaysian grand prix the rider left it late in the qualifying session to edge out his only title rival fellow spaniard danny patro into second spot on the grid. will complete the front row head of going to champion casey stoner that enzo is twenty eight points clear at the top of the standings with three races left which means the twenty ten win it could secure his second title at the supply kit but the twenty five year old beast when the drugs are finishing outside the top twelve. position is already. pushing for a full list of the model. we need to we're going to read on the top of the body

because he's used these if you will in the. people who were first. russian has an outside chance of being crowned the formula ready to champion he goes into sunday's final race of the season fourteen points behind his rival stoffel the one from belgium from barcelona is constantine but top off. for the whole season rushes the new kid out and stuff it one born have been in a league of their own as the sparrow have won eleven out of the twelve races so for eighteen year old will end the season with the most to be tourist seven but despite one born winning just four he has been more consistent finishing on the podium ten times in twelve outings and headed into the final weekend at the catalonia circuit within the eleven point cushion inset of these race the belgian started from second sport while combat was feet from qualification however the russian produced in the

electric start overtaking two opponents to get close to his title rival but the new incident slowed the red bull junior team driver down as a safety car appeared on the track and as a result the twenty five left race was shortened to just twelve and columbus. who started from pole coolidge his first victory of the season leaving vaughn durant to edge into second in a battle behind him well it was a very short race a long safety car period in the beginning. but yet for me it didn't play it so much because i was anyway in front of daniel one door and increased his lead to fourteen points ahead of the decisive race however that says it's not the end of the battle and the crucial day will be on sunday. today but not for strange of anything everything you can still happening tomorrow. looks like a rain forecast and just mentor in there is no pressure. despite the

fact that could add failed to cut the point deficit in the first race with twenty five still up for grabs at american olesen store on sunday well the way to not only being crowned champion but also a bucketing half a million euros and a chance for the big time on sunday about r.t. barcelona spain exciting stuff not funny lance armstrong says it has been a. couple of weeks is the scrape cyclists spoke out for the first time since a report by the u.s. anti doping agency kind he was the linchpin of a major doping ring at the sport's governing body the cia's cheechoo respond on monday and the side of the texan will keep his record seven tour de france titles while the cancer survivor is more anxious his charity foundation should carry on live strong great love his fifteenth anniversary on friday. thank you so much for his support it's it means the world to me to all of us we will not be deterred we will move forward and we will continue to serve the twenty eight million people

around the world that need us the most so that's the sport for the moment. nuclear fashionable side. radioactive fallout of government betrayal of the government. and lauded and lauded and claude how can the truth be revealed if there's no official evidence there was indeed a very bright day to the servicemen concerned who were given no problem protection and to the people of this country generally because of the right deal at the full.

the secrets of the u.k.'s nuclear tests. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images. from the streets of canada. corporations are. there who are on the rise. for the dismissal of the feds offensive. stop us election close to twenty second.

well look. it's technology. all the latest developments from around russia we've. covered. the british. find out what's really happening to the global economy. headlines to two name .